| Robby |
Does it work? (He points to the tape recorder
and the video camera). I have the same one (he means the recorder). |
| Rainer |
At least the tapes run. Well Robby, your new
album - what kind of music will be on that one? Something like "Versions"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, sort of "Versions". There'll be a few
of my own compositions plus some old ones like on "Versions". |
| Rainer |
Cover versions? |
| Robby |
Yeah. There'll be an Elvis Presley one. |
| Rainer |
Oh, which one? |
| Robby |
Well, Linda's ecstatic about that (Linda, Robby's
PR manager, smiled). It'll be "I want you, I need you, I love you". |
| Rainer |
Ah, that one "... with all my heart." |
| Robby |
Yeah. And also the "Lonely Teardrops". |
| Rainer |
Isn't that a Ray Orbison song? |
| Robby |
No - Jackie Wilson. And a few other surprises. |
| Rainer |
You should do a Robert Johnson cover version,
Robby, I know he's one of your favorites, and also one of mine. |
| Robby |
If I could do as good as he could I would do
(he laughs). |
| Rainer |
The Rolling Stones did his "Love In Vain", not
mentioning that it was a Robert Johnson tune. |
| Robby |
Really? Huh! Did they get away with that? |
| Rainer |
I think so. To my knowledge nobody complained. |
| Robby |
That's fun. Actually "Crossroads" is good the
way Cream did it. I like that, although I still like Robert Johnson's version
better, I think. It's amazing that probably very low percent of the people
who heard Cream also heard Robert Johnson. |
| Rainer |
He was the master of slide guitar. |
| Robby |
Oh definitely! |
| Rainer |
Was he the first one who inspired you to use
a bottleneck? |
| Robby |
Not the first, but one of the first. |
| Rainer |
He recorded less than 35 songs in a hotel room
... |
| Robby |
Yeah, not many. Some people have showed me some
bootleg stuff supposed to be Robert Johnson. It's hard to tell. It might
be. It's really bad quality stuff, you know, who knows. |
| Rainer |
I heard of a Robert Johnson CD coming out very
soon, with all known songs plus unreleased material. |
| Robby |
Really? Must get this one when it's out. |
| Rainer |
Your Halfspeed Master LP and CD "Robby Krieger"
contains some surprising stuff. I especially like the song "Costa Brava". |
| |
|
Robby Krieger live 1989.
Photo © Rainer Moddemann
|
|
| Robby |
Good! |
| Rainer |
Have you ever been at the Costa Brava in
Spain? |
| Robby |
Yeah. Actually we drove along the coast, stayed
at this big old castle up there, I forgot the name of it, it was a beautiful
place! Yeah, I liked that I. And we went to Barcelona and Madrid, saw some
Flamenco, and visited the Ramirez shop where I bought a guitar. I have three
Ramirez guitars. Have one 63, the same exact model that Sabecca uses. That
was fun - I didn't know that he used that model, and I had mine for 20 years,
and I saw him recently, looked inside his guitar .. a 63! Same one as mine! |
| Rainer |
How did you get the idea to write "Spanish
Caravan"? |
| Robby |
Oh, from Flamenco stuff that I learned. A song
called "Granadinas", which is a form that everybody learns, that's more
classical. |
| Rainer |
So "Spanish Caravan" was a kind of cover version
or a Spanish traditional? |
| Robby |
Yeah, in fact they sued us for it. The people
who owned whatever song that came from, they tried to sue us for it, but
they didn't get very much, cos it's such a widely known thing (sings the
guitar solo from "Spanish Caravan"), but they claimed they owned this little
something stupid. |
| Rainer |
How much did you have to pay them? |
| Robby |
Aaaah, not that much. I think we gave them the
publishing that was earned in France or something, because that's where they
were. |
| Rainer |
Unfortunately "Spanish Caravan" was cut... |
| Robby |
Yeah. (grins) |
| Rainer |
Where's the lost part of it? |
| Robby |
Ha, I wish I'd know! |
| Rainer |
That's pity! I heard you worked a long time
at that. |
| Robby |
It was a couple of minutes that was cut out
from the version on the album, I spent a whole day in the studio on that,
and the producers cut it out finally. I still can do it, but I haven't done
it in a long time. I definitely plan to record that one day, you know, to
re-record that. |
| Rainer |
Why did they cut that part out? |
| Robby |
Oh, it was a little long, they said. Maybe they
wanted it for a single, but I don't know why they cut it, to tell you the
truth. |
| Rainer |
What guitar did you use for "Spanish Caravan"? |
| Robby |
For that part I used the actual Ramirez guitar,
and I guess that's why they didn't use it, it didn't ... well, we used that
guitar for the first part of "Spanish Caravan" and went to that electric
one... |
| Rainer |
Are there Flamenco guitarists you like? |
| Robby |
Yes, Sabioas and Juan Serrano. |
| Rainer |
May I have another Coors? I read in a book that
Morrison also had a few of these? |
| Robby |
Coors? No, he didn't like Coors that much (laughs).
He drank Miller's. I like it myself. |
| Rainer |
Let's talk a little bit about the videos that
The Doors released. First, "Dance On Fire" - do you agree with the visual
concept? Did you work on that as well? |
| Robby |
On "Dance On Fire"? I didn't really have that
much to do with it. Ray was the video man and you know he loves to do that
kind of stuff, I didn't really think we had that much good stuff that we
could make a video, you know, but I guess the Doors' fans wanna have anything
that we have, you know, anything possible, so... |
| Rainer |
I visited one of my fanclub members over here
in L.A. recently, and she had three outtakes of"People Are Strange" from
the Murray The K Show... |
| Robby |
Three versions? |
| Rainer |
Yeah. In one Jim forgot to start singing, ... |
| Robby |
Ah really (laughs)? How did she get that? |
| Rainer |
I don't know. Probably some bootleg stuff. A
good title for that would be "The Making Of People Are Strange", you know,
it looked like the complete thing, with all takes. |
| Robby |
Really? Well, I remember that. Where did she
get hold of that? |
| Rainer |
I don't know. But it looked funny! |
| Robby |
Where were we standing? On a fountain or
something? |
| Rainer |
Yeah, on a fountain. |
| Robby |
(laughs) Well, I don't really remember. |
| Rainer |
Where was that filmed? |
| Robby |
In New York down by the bowering. |
| Rainer |
Do you like the video Ray filmed for the song
"L.A. Woman" on the "Dance On Fire" video? |
| Robby |
Yeah, it's not bad! |
| Rainer |
The songline "Mr Mojo Risin'" - did Jim get
that from the song "I got my Mojo workin'"? |
| Robby |
I'm sure that had something to do with it, yeah,
we used to do that song sometimes, but you know that's the anagram of his
name. Yeah, I think he got it more from the "Mojo"-song, and he figured out
later that it was an anagram of his name. |
| Rainer |
Remember the Super-8 film of the New Haven-bust
featured in your "Roadhouse Blues" video ... where did you get that from? |
| Robby |
I forgot who came up with that one. Somebody
that was there. Linda You guys bought it from the guy who was there in the
audience. |
| Robby |
And you know there were "Life Magazine" reporters
and they caught a lot of it. |
| Rainer |
The "Unknown Soldier" promotion-film .. . who's
concept was that? And who did the camera-work? |
| Robby |
Jim figured that one out. Peter Abrahamson,
the guy who did the first "Break On Through" one, you know, the first
Doors-promotion-film, well, the same guy did that. Oh, Mark Abrahamson, that's
him. |
| Rainer |
What about the Jubilee-scenes celebrating the
end of World War II and the Vietnam-clips? |
| Robby |
Who's idea was that? Oh, I forgot. |
| Rainer |
Did The Doors plan to record the Hollywood Bowl
concert for a later release on film or for a live-album? |
| Robby |
Yeah, we did. You know we had that shoot, that
three-camera shoot plus 8-track sound, yeah, we did intend to do that. We
didn't know exactly what to do with it for the future. You know we were making
a movie at that time called "Feast Of Friends", so I think we wanted to use
it in that. We finally added "The End" to the movie, but then we later forgot
about the films. |
| Rainer |
Do you remember where "Crystal Ship" was filmed
for "American Bandstand"? It looks like a very early clip. |
| Robby |
Yeah, early 67, I remember. We were meeting
Dick Clark. It's funny cos Dick Clark was .. , ah, you know he had that
"goody-two-shoes"-image. (laughs) and in order to get over that image he
came to our dressing-room and he started talking like "Hey guys, let's fuck
some chicks" (laughs) , trying to be a real tough guy, you know "How's fucking
junks" (laughs). Hey, let's get this dog out! (Robby jumps up and tries to
decoy his dog Teddy out of the room) Teddy, come on! |
| Rainer |
(after a little break) Do you know that I found
for The Doors the lost "Hello I Love You" video from Frankfurt, West
Germany? |
| Robby |
Oh yeah, you did? From the show in Frankfurt?
That's great! Oh yes, we'll have a screening of that in a few days to see
if we can use it. |
| Rainer |
And now I'm on the track of two indoor-concerts
that were shot in the hall. |
| Robby |
Were those from ... ah... Amsterdam? |
| Rainer |
No, Frankfurt as well. |
| Robby |
The indoor shot was the "Soldier"-show? |
| Rainer |
Yeah. You did that song there, too. |
| Robby |
It was pretty dark in there. |
| Rainer |
Well, I hope you can use it. But back to "Dance
On Fire": The "Adagio" - when was that recorded? And did you actually use
a string quartet during the recording? |
| Robby |
Well, not a quartet, but a whole string section,
about 20 guys I think, and that was at the same time as the "Soft Parade",
when we had all these strings and horns and stuff, so we recorded this one
as well with them. I forgot whose idea it was, We all liked that song for
a long time, you know. I like this piece of music, too, you know. Especially
Jim liked this "European schmalz", as he used to talk about this kind of
music. |
| Rainer |
You used it in "Feast Of Friends" as well... |
| Robby |
Yeah. It's a good song. It's pretty popular
in Europe, isn't it? |
| Rainer |
Yes, sure. And it became one of the rare Doors'
instrumentals, and it's also on one of the bootlegs, "Rock Is Dead". I remember
another instrumental you did at the Matrix, Gershwin's "Summertime". |
| Robby |
Yeah, that's right. |
| Rainer |
By the way - what do you think about bootlegs,
I mailed you a few, I think, with rare Matrix' songs. |
| Robby |
Yeah, hmmm... |
| Rainer |
Do you remember those concerts? |
| Robby |
Oh yeah, I remember the Matrix. |
| Rainer |
Just one guy sitting there clapping... |
| Robby |
(laughs) I think that was a soundcheck, because
the place was packed when we played there, so it couldn't have been one play,
one guy clapping, it must have been a soundcheck. |
| Rainer |
"Rock Is Dead" - do you like this one? |
| Robby |
(laughs) No, I never liked that one, that was
pretty much out of nowhere, you know I mean we were just kinda drunken, you
know just fishing around for something, I wish it wouldn't have come out
on a bootleg, even. |
| Rainer |
I heard the tape was stolen from Rothchild... |
| Robby |
Yeah, that's the story. It disappeared from
his desk. |
| Rainer |
When was the recording -- was it after or before
the Miami trial? |
| Robby |
That must ... ah ...before. |
| Rainer |
Before? That's kinda interesting. |
| Robby |
Why? Why do you ask? |
| Rainer |
Well, before ... the lyrics sound like a comment
on the Miami trial. |
| Robby |
Hmm, well, could have been.. . well, let's see:
That was during the "Soft Parade" also, as I remember, or it could have been
"Morrison Hotel", gee, Miami was. . . was "Morrison Hotel" after Miami? I
forgot. |
| Rainer |
Yeah, it was. |
| Robby |
Okay, then it might have been after Miami. |
| Rainer |
Would you like to do the soundtrack for the
forthcoming Doors' movie? |
| Robby |
Sure! Well... |
| Rainer |
Ray is talking about the Doors' movie for
years... |
| Robby |
(laughs) Yeah, I know. It might happen now.
They have to come up with some money pretty soon to keep the whole thing
going, you know. The people who have the rights, Bill Graham and this other
guy, you know, they were supposed to get a writer who's gonna write the script
and all that. So far we had about three scripts and they had been terrible
(laughs), so I'm afraid that'd never happen, you know. But you never know.
I have seen the fourth script, and I think this could be a good movie. |
| Rainer |
Dave Brock of"Wild Child" could be a good actor
for Jim's part, I think. |
| Robby |
Yeah, he could be great, he would be very good
... |
| Rainer |
...for the "early" Morrison... |
| Robby |
Yeah! (laughs) There are plenty of guys around
who could play the "later" Morrison (laughs)... |
| Rainer |
Let's go back to the early days... your first
band was called "The Psychedelic Rangers". What was this band all about? |
| Robby |
(laughs) Just some friends of mine. |
| Rainer |
Any recordings left? |
| Robby |
No, I'm afraid not. Actually John was in that
band, too. Our one and only demo was called "Paranoia". (sings) "Paranoo-i-a".
Was kinda like "Love", like the old "Love" days, kinda like "Hey Joe" chords.
That's good, actually. We had this great piano-player, a friend of mine named
Grant Johnson, who lives up north now, and he could play jazz at that age,
you know, and me and John and this other guitarplayer, a friend of mine named
David Wolfe, who was my guitar teacher, he still lives in Los Angeles and
plays jazz in a band named "Citizen", we did a movie-soundtrack, ah - I forgot
the name of it unfortunately, for the Psychedelic Rangers. But, you know,
David and I, we both copied a terrible Flamenco record called "Dos Flamencos",
it had these two guys playing flamenco together, and he taught me how to
play the guitar. We were locked into a room at our school for three hours
a day, in order to practice our guitars, you know. That's why I always had
my guitar with me. I also started to read a Mickey Baker book, but did not
even finish the second page. When I saw a terrific Chuck Berry concert at
the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, I turned into Rock'n'Roll and bought my
first electric guitar, a Gibson SG, the one that got stolen. Before I just
played acoustic guitars, and I had a holder for my harp. Before The Doors
I used to play at coffee-houses and I played Bob Dylan-songs. I also played
with a strange band called "The Back Bay Chamberpot Terriers". When I got
interested in Indian Sitar music I met John Densmore in a Maharishi Meditation
seminar, who was already playing with The Doors at that time. A few weeks
later he came over to my house with Jim Morrison and we played and sang for
a couple of hours. That was the kick for me. They needed a guitar player
and they asked me to join them. I was a bit skeptic at the beginning but
after a few sessions and gigs I knew The Doors would make it. |
| Rainer |
Did you ever play with "Rick and the Ravens"? |
| Robby |
No, I never did. I sat in sometimes. John played
with them. |
| Rainer |
The first demo record of The Doors ... you didn't
play on this, right? |
| Robby |
No, I didn't. I didn't play on the first Doors
demo. I wasn't in the group then. |
| Rainer |
Which songs were the first ones that you recorded
for the first Doors album? |
| Robby |
Aehm, for the first Doors LP? Well, the first
song we ever recorded was "Indian Summer". |
| Rainer |
Surprise, surprise! "Indian Summer"? |
| Robby |
Yeah. "Indian Summer" was the song that came
out on the fifth album "Morrison Hotel". But that was actually the first
song we ever recorded. |
| Rainer |
You used the same recording for "Morrison Hotel"?
I always wondered why this song sounded so different from the other material
on "Morrison Hotel". |
| Robby |
Yes, it's the same one. You know, we pepped
it up a little bit. And then the second thing we did was "Moonlight Drive".
You know, not the version you hear on the "Strange Days" album. But in fact
it got lost, stupidly, that was a good version which I wish we could put
out, but somebody lost it! |
| Rainer |
"Light My Fire" was your song ... |
| Robby |
Yeah! |
| Rainer |
... but I also read that Jim helped you with
some lyrics. |
| Robby |
Right. |
| Rainer |
Which ones? |
| Robby |
(smiles) The one about the "funeral pyre".
(laughs) |
| Rainer |
Oh, that one,.. |
| Robby |
Yeah, that verse is Jim's. |
| Rainer |
But it is definitely your song? |
| Robby |
That's right. |
| Rainer |
Which other songs did you write for the album?
The credits always say "The Doors". |
| Robby |
The songs for the first album were written by
all four of us. Ray wrote the introduction to "Light My Fire", but the lyrics
for most songs were Jim's. The music was developed by all of us. For the
lyrics Jim was a phenomena. He came to our sessions with a piece of paper
he had scribbled some lyrics on. He was humming the music to it, and we all
started work on the melodies. Especially the rhythm and the solo parts. |
| Rainer |
I remember an early version of "Light My Fire"
from the Matrix. Ray did not play the intro which was recorded on record
before ... |
| Robby |
We play a lot of gigs at that time and we had
to improvise a lot. I mean, many songs developed on stage or we worked them
out during our concerts. |
| Rainer |
What's the Blue Bus in "The End"? Could it simply
be the real busline from Santa Monica to the UCLA as written in one of the
Quarterlies? |
| Robby |
Possible. I have read the article in the Quarterly,
too. Yes, there is a blue bus there -- oh, one funny thing : my wife Lynn
was hanging out with Jim and some other people, and they were just hitch-hiking
somewhere, and all of the sudden this big blue bus comes up and picks them
up, and this weird hippie was driving it with a weird dog, and he drove them
all over town, everywhere they wanted to go, never said a word, and then
they got off and never saw him again. And they were freaking out, cos Jim
had written about the Blue Bus earlier. |
| Rainer |
You started using synthesizers on the second
LP, changing the sound of Jim's voice. Did you also change the sound of your
guitar with a synthesizer? |
| Robby |
No, not really. Not the guitar. At the time
all they had was the Moog, you know, and they could use it on the keyboards
and on voices and acoustic guitars ... |
| Rainer |
Do you remember which instrument Ray Manzarek
plays on "Love Me Two Times"? Was it a harpsichord? |
| Robby |
Yeah, it was a real harpsichord. |
| Rainer |
And "Unhappy Girl" had a backwards piano... |
| Robby |
Yeah, it was actually organ and piano played
backwards. |
| Rainer |
There's this line in "I Can't See Your Face
In My Mind" from "Strange Days" saying - "carnival dogs consume the line"
- what's the meaning of this? |
| Robby |
Maybe you could say the line being the linearity
of the world, you know, with the image of the dogs it means, you know, everything
is not as we see it. |
| Rainer |
Do you remember the recording of "When The Music's
Over"? |
| Robby |
Sure! |
| Rainer |
Someone said it was recorded like first the
music and then Jim's voice. Is that true? It sounds so perfect... |
| Robby |
(laughs) Yeah, I know. When we used to do it,
we knew sort of what he was gonna sing, so: Let's kinda do it that way. The
day it was supposed to be recorded he was on an acid trip somewhere and he
never showed up to the studio. So we recorded the music before, and when
he finally came we needed only one vocal recording, then it was perfect. |
| Rainer |
By the way - is there any Doors song on record
you don't like? |
| Robby |
A Doors song I don't like? Aehm, I think "My
Wild Love" is one of my least favorites. |
| Rainer |
A weird song. It's an unusual Doors song, without
any instruments. |
| Robby |
Yeah, yeah (mumbles). |
| Rainer |
How did you guys record that? |
| Robby |
We sort of needed an extra song or something
(laughs)... And everybody who happened to be in the studio joined in. We
were looking through Jim's poetry books and, you know, here's one, let's
make a song out of it. Jim was humming the melody like a simple children's
song, and we all just followed him. |
| Rainer |
There's a little interesting thing I noticed
listening to your records. On the live recordings you always played your
solo in A minor or B minor. But the studio version is half a tone lower. |
| Robby |
Which song? |
| Rainer |
"Light My Fire". |
| Robby |
On "Light My Fire" it's half a tone lower? |
| Rainer |
Yes it is! |
| Robby |
That's hard! Maybe... hmmm... |
| Rainer |
Well, the first LP version is half a tone lower,
same as the live versions, but on the 7" version it's A minor as well. |
| Robby |
Wait. On the original LP it is in A flat or
something? |
| Rainer |
Yeah. |
| Robby |
It's weird. We must ... ah... I think they slowed
it down. I always thought it sounded pretty slow (laughs). Impossible! Are
you sure about that? |
| Rainer |
Yeah (laughs). |
| Robby |
That's weird. I have to check that out
(laughs). |
| Rainer |
Why didn't you use the studio version of "The
Celebration Of The Lizard"? Is it so different from the "Absolutely
Live"-version. |
| Robby |
Aehm, so, it's not that much different, but
... |
| Rainer |
In "No One Here Gets Out Alive" I read it was
25 minutes long ... |
| Robby |
Well, parts of it were used, yeah, but parts
of the live version were improvised, you know, so it's not the same. |
| Rainer |
I hope it will be published some day. |
| Robby |
I really don't remember why we didn't use it,
you know, I guess we used the good part of it, you know, the other parts
we thought were not good. |
| Rainer |
Is the original tape is still in your
archives? |
| Robby |
I really don't know. I haven't checked on
that. |
| Rainer |
Is "Not To Touch The Earth" from the "Waiting
For The Sun" album an outtake from the studio version or was it an extra
recording? |
| Robby |
Well, that was recorded separately. But it was
meant to go in there. But it was recorded in one piece. |
| Rainer |
"Wintertime Love", "Spanish Caravan" and "Yes,
The River Knows" were written by you? |
| Robby |
Yeah. |
| Rainer |
One of my favorite Doors songs is "Yes, The
River Knows", such a moody song. |
| Robby |
Yeah, thanks! |
| Rainer |
Where did you get the inspiration from? |
| Robby |
Aah... at that time I was ... oh, it was one
of the first songs I've ever written. I was trying to keep my ... you know
... I was trying to learn from Jim, you know, keeping the subjects on a
broadening scale; so "Light My Fire": Fire, air, earth and water; so water:
"Yes, The River Knows". |
| Rainer |
The sessions for "Waiting For The Sun" took
very long for the album, but when was the song with the same name recorded? |
| Robby |
Oh, that was recorded earlier - or later? Either
later or earlier. That came out on "Morrison Hotel", actually. Of course
it was planned to be on the third album, but I don't know why we didn't put
it on. |
| Rainer |
It is always surprising for Doors fans that
you guys used to play without a real bass guitarist at concerts. |
| Rainer |
We got along pretty well without a bass guitarist
on stage, that's all. This was Ray's business, he liked to have control about
everything. For our recording sessions we always used real bass guitars,
but it was Ray who told the guys what they had to play. |
| Rainer |
Who's idea was it to use strings and horns and
stuff like that for "The Soft Parade"? |
| Robby |
Rothchild. For that album he was a kinda George
Martin for us. (laughs) It was kinda stupid I thought, cos The Beatles did
it, and we had to do it, too. This album was our "Sergeant Pepper", but it
was silly, because The Beatles had done it much better. |
| Rainer |
Have you ever met The Beatles? |
| Robby |
No, just George. |
| Rainer |
I read in a book that Jim Morrison was in the
studio with them when they recorded the "White Album", and he sang with them
on "Happiness Is A Warm Gun". |
| Robby |
Hmm, that's possible, but... ah, he met some
of them in London I know, when I wasn't around or something. But I only met
George. |
| Rainer |
It's you who sings the chorus on "Running Blue".
Does the beginning of the song come from a Leadbelly song named "Poor
Howard"? |
| Robby |
That's right, Oh, you know, Jim made that part
up, so I can't take credit for that. But Leadbelly didn't write that either,
that's a traditional thing, an old cowboy refrain or an old slaves' song.
You know, "My Wild Love" is the same thing, you know (sings the first line
of the song), it's one of those old chain gang songs... |
| Rainer |
How was it working with Paul Rothchild in the
studio? |
| Robby |
He worked a lot on our songs, especially on
"Soft Parade" and "Strange Days". He was the one who developed The Doors'
sound. Most other songs we recorded the way we used to play them live. Some
time ago we listened to the master tapes of "The Soft Parade" and I wish
we'd put out the album again without all the horns and strings and stuff.
That would be an easy thing to do. |
| Rainer |
At the end of "Touch Me" you hear the sentence
"Stronger than dirt". Was this from the Ajax ad? |
| Robby |
(laughs) Yeah! I don't know who's idea was that
but there was the chorus (sings) "da da da dap", and somebody said Hey, that
sounds like Ajax', and we started saying that, you know. |
| Rainer |
Why wasn't "Who Scared You" on the "Soft Parade"
album? |
| Robby |
I think Rothchild didn't like it. |
| Rainer |
Is It true that Jim didn't want to record "Tell
All The People"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, he was afraid of a political
classification. |
| Rainer |
He didn't want people to follow him? |
| Robby |
No, it's just the fact that he thought it was
kinda political, and if he'd sang it people would think he wrote it. I don't
know. |
| Rainer |
And why did you write those lines? |
| Robby |
Actually that song was of a - remember the frame
"follow me down" - that was from a Leadbelly song called "Fanton Street Blues",
so that was more a blues idea than political. |
| Rainer |
Leadbelly was one of your favorites, right? |
| Robby |
Yes, like Robert Johnson. |
| Rainer |
Do you remember the studio where "Morrison Hotel"
was recorded? |
| Robby |
Yeah, it was in the Elektra studio, not in Sunset,
which was for the first and second album, and the fourth and fifth at Elektra.
The facilities at Elektra were much better. The echo chamber at Sunset was
pretty good, but not the latest thing. Paul wanted to create all effects
electronically. |
| Rainer |
Can you tell me who's the "Ashen Lady" in "Roadhouse
Blues"? |
| Robby |
Who's the "Ashen Lady"? Well, I don't know who
he meant by that. Probably not a real person. |
| Rainer |
What is a "Peace Frog"? |
| Robby |
Well, what's a "Peace Frog" ...? |
| Rainer |
Was it a military button or something? |
| Robby |
Well, that's possible. I never really asked
Jim about it. I think it was because of the guitar sound (sings) de-de-dep
..., which sounded like a croaking frog's "quak-quak". I never asked Jim
about his meanings or his stuff, you know, because he never answered, you
know. |
| Rainer |
I always thought you and Jim were closest friends,
right? |
| Robby |
I think so, yeah. We wrote a lot of stuff when
he stayed at my house, you know, together. He was not that crazy one when
I first met him, you know, but the first time we played together he seemed
a little out there, you know, cos after the session I remember he and this
other guy got into this big fight, you know, over nothing! I think it was
about a drug deal actually (laughs), a drug deal gone sour (laughs). |
| Rainer |
Did you take any care of the production of the
"Absolutely Live" album? It was cut together from so many bits and pieces
of songs and concerts. |
| Robby |
Yeah, we all sat there for weeks and weeks and
we listened to every little thing, so: this verse from this concert, this
version of ... Rothchild is famous for that, you know (laughs). Like the
Paul Butterfield album, the first one. It sounds like it's a live album,
but the whole studio was filled with pieces of tapes hanging up on hooks
(laughs), one piece after another. |
| Rainer |
Are there many live recordings left you could
use? |
| Robby |
Not many, not much! |
| Rainer |
Did you always play your Gibson SG in
concerts? |
| Robby |
Yeah, the red one. The black one was for slide,
and it was a Les Paul. |
| |
|
Rainer in front of Robby's homestudio holding Robby's famous black Les Paul guitar. Watch the video "The Soft Parade" to see the guitar in action.
Photo © Linda Kyriazi
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|
| Rainer |
Are those the same guitars you used in the
studio? |
| Robby |
Ah, yes. |
| Rainer |
What kind of strings did you use? |
| Robby |
In those days I used "Super Slinkies", 9 to
36, and then I moved to 10's. But in The Doors I always used the 9's, the
lighter ones, cos I never used a pick in those days. |
| Rainer |
You are designing your own Gibson guitar right
now? |
| Robby |
Yeah, they're making a Gibson now, it's a sort
of an SG-shape, but it's got a sunburst finish, you know, nice wood, a nice
piece of wood, now they not use good wood anymore, but for this they're using
a good one. And it's got a very special neck, they'll have a graphite neck,
cos the SG's neck was too humbling, you know, cos there's this long neck
just stuck on, it wasn't very strong, so they have this graphite neck and,
well, you know, I've been waiting for this for two years to be finished,
it should be this year. |
| |
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Robby with his Gibson guitar.
Photo © Linda Kyriazi
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|
| Rainer |
Did they ask you to do a thing like this or
did you offer your help? |
| Robby |
Well, they have a new guy called Bob Gibson,
the president, and he was a Doors fan, comes from Harvard and I forgot who
called who, but I've always used Gibson anyway, so... |
| Rainer |
Yeah, I've seen a few Gibsons up there in your
studio. I come to the "L.A. Woman" album. It was a kind of live-thing in
the studio. Were all the songs recorded live? |
| Robby |
"L.A. Woman"? Most of them were, uh, Jim did
a few overdubs but we wanted to get a live feeling. Above all the album was
not produced by Paul Rothchild anymore, and we felt free to do what we liked.
We did it in our rehearsal room. Did you ever go there? |
| Rainer |
Sure, it's just opposite the Alta Cienega
Motel. |
| Robby |
Right! (laughter) |
| Rainer |
The place changed a lot... |
| Robby |
I haven't seen it for a long time. I wonder
what they did. |
| Rainer |
It's painted gray and it is an Anti-Aids-center
right now. |
| Robby |
You got inside? |
| Rainer |
No. It was closed. Back to "L.A. Woman". On
"Cars Hiss By My Window" there's Jim imitating a guitar. Wasn't there any
guitar around? |
| Robby |
(laughs) No, a harp, a harmonica sound, that
was what he was doing. He couldn't really play a harp very good. Some people
think it's a real harp. |
| Rainer |
On some bootleg material Jim plays a horrible
harp! |
| Robby |
Don't say that when Jim is around (laughs). |
| Rainer |
What can you tell me about those mysterious
lines in "Hyacinth House"? You know, "... I see the bathroom is clear, I
think that somebody's near ...", like that. |
| Robby |
The "Hyacinth House" was my house. We were writing
some songs, and I had hyacinths in the backyard. So it wasn't the Hyatt Hotel,
as some people might think, which we used to call the "Riot Hotel". But you
know in the same song there are the lines about the bathroom, see, we were
just sitting and writing that song and Jim had to go to the bathroom (laughs),
he was waiting for somebody to get out of the bathroom. So it has got no
deep meaning. Remember the "lions" in that song? They were my cats among
the hyacinths, and in fact I had a lion, a bobcat, a big cat, you know, which
was in the backyard when we were writing that song. |
| Rainer |
Let's switch over to the "Other Voices" album.
I always thought it was a very good album, but it didn't sound like the Doors
anymore, especially the music, and you and Ray decided to sing ... |
| Robby |
(laughs) I never considered myself a singer,
but Jim wasn't there, so... |
| Rainer |
Ray was mocking about you as being "Golden Throat
Krieger" on your '72 tour. He always made this joke when he announced "The
Mosquito" about your highschool Spanish. |
| |
|
Robby live.
Photo © Linda Kyriazi
|
|
| Robby |
I know, it was his standard intro for "The
Mosquito". |
| Rainer |
Did you write that song? |
| Robby |
Yeah, I got the idea from a Mexican band doing
traditional songs, and I wrote an equivalent. |
| Rainer |
Someone said that it was a traditional song... |
| Robby |
Yeah, pretty much. Do you know that this one
was one of our biggest songs aside from the stuff with Jim? |
| Rainer |
Many people covered it ... |
| Robby |
Yeah, a lot. I also heard a German version of
it, pretty weird. |
| Rainer |
It was a guy named Gary Wynn who sang a German
version. On "Ships With Sails", a song that John wrote, Ray Neopolitan played
bass; was this one of the songs that you planned for Jim to do the vocals
for after his return from Paris or was this a left-over from "Morrison Hotel",
cos Ray also played bass on this album? |
| Robby |
No, no, we wrote that song after Jim had died.
"Tightrope Ride" is one of them that was done for Jim, you know, Jim was
in Paris a long time before he died, and we had worked out a lot of stuff
that we planned to do with Jim as a six-piece band for the road, and he never
came back. In fact Jim had never quit The Doors, what else could he do, he
would have been dead-bored after a couple of months. I think he always would
have come back to the group. |
| Rainer |
Was "Other Voices" successful in the States?
Did you get a golden record for it? |
| Robby |
I don't remember. I don't think so, it just
sold a quarter of a million or so. How was it doing in Europe? Did it better
there? |
| Rainer |
Yeah, it is still in print ... The bass guitarists
who played with you I like this instrument because I play bass myself. Were
they always told how to play the basslines or were they allowed to put their
own ideas into a song? |
| Robby |
Usually they had to play pretty much of what
Ray played on the piano bass (sings the bass from "Light My Fire"), like
the instance in "Light My Fire" there is a bass on there but it was overdubbed
later, just the same thing that Ray did. |
| Rainer |
It wasn't the keyboard bass on that song? A
real bass-player? |
| Robby |
Yes, it was a real bass. A Fender bass. And
some of the songs Doug Lubahn would come up with something of his own, for
instance in the song "Waiting For The Sun" he came up with some stuff, and
on "Love Me Two Times" I told him how to play that. |
| Rainer |
Do you play the harmonica on "Down On The
Farm"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, I did (laughs). |
| Rainer |
There's this nice song you played with Jim at
a Norman Mailer-benefit called "Far Arden Blues" or something - was this
the only song you played there or did you do more stuff? |
| Robby |
Yeah, there was some other stuff, but it was
kinda pretty ragged, you know. |
| Rainer |
What's "Far Arden" in your opinion? People say
Jim means the Garden Of Eden with it... |
| Robby |
"Far Arden" is a place in England called Arden,
which was mentioned by English poets. |
| Rainer |
I love the guitar on that track but unfortunately
it was overdubbed with a poem. Wish I could hear that without the poem. |
| Robby |
(laughs) |
| Rainer |
When did you start recording "Full Circle"?
After the 1972 tour? |
| Robby |
Yeah, that's right. |
| Rainer |
Were you aware that this would be the last Doors
album? |
| Robby |
No, that's funny, we just called it like that.
When went to Europe to try to get a singer - so we were still playing as
The Doors after "Full Circle". |
| Rainer |
You were auditioning a few singers, I think:
Jess Roden, Howard Werth - who else? Iggy Pop? |
| Robby |
No, we actually never did... |
| Rainer |
He always was interested, is that true? |
| Robby |
Yeah, but we never got together enough for some
reason. We actually never rehearsed with Howard Werth actually, just talked
to him one day. Oh, here comes my son Waylon. You know he's named after a
German wine, Whelener Sonnenberg, it's a Mosel wine, and it's one of the
best from the Saar river, I guess, a real sweet wine. I used to be really
into German wine. |
| Rainer |
Jim had the same taste, I think. I read he ordered
100 bottles of German wine named Goldener Oktober. |
| Robby |
That's funny, I didn't know that. |
| Rainer |
"The Peking King And The New York Queen" was
one of Ray's songs, I guess. There's this East/West dialogue in it. The West
part is Ray, who's doing the East part? You? |
| Robby |
I think Ray did both. |
| Rainer |
John told me yesterday that a "Verdilac" was
a vampire. Do you agree? |
| Robby |
Yeah, you didn't know that? I guess it's an
Austrian expression for vampire, from an old movie. |
| Rainer |
About the "An American Prayer" album - wasn't
it a kind of weird job to do the album with the voice of Jim from a tape? |
| Robby |
Yeah, but it was fun, too. And it was hard.
We had to use sentences and words, cut them here and there, but it was worth
doing that. |
| Rainer |
Do you only play guitar on this album, I mean
just guitar? |
| Robby |
No, I also played some other instruments, but
most of it was guitar. |
| Rainer |
Who did the "Gloria" chorus on "Alive She
Cried"? |
| Robby |
Oh, we all did. |
| Rainer |
But it was overdubbed later I bet. |
| Robby |
Yeah, but don't tell... |
| Rainer |
Well, it's one secret everybody knows. |
| Robby |
Shock! Shock! |
| Rainer |
Was "Gloria" on "Alive She Cried" the complete
take? |
| Robby |
No, it wasn't. The uncut take is more dirty,
definitely, and it's much longer. Somebody still has the original, it might
come out one day. |
| Rainer |
The guitar was kinda sterile - was it also
overdubbed? |
| Robby |
No, it wasn't overdubbed. That's why it sounds
sterile! (laughs) No, the reason for that was - it was a soundcheck, and
there was no audience there, so maybe I wasn't really into that. |
| Rainer |
Was it a soundcheck for the recording of "Absolutely
Live"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, well, for the Aquarius concerts, which
was a lot of"Absolutely Live". |
| Rainer |
You overdubbed "Texas Radio And The Big Beat"
as well, but it is without dubs on "Dance On Fire" and it's still gorgeous. |
| Robby |
Yeah, yeah, well, I did the overdubs. But you're
right: It was good without dubs. |
| Rainer |
Danish TV had the complete show on recently.
I love the song without the overdubs on "Alive She Cried". Do you remember
the recording of "Little Red Rooster" with John Sebastian on harp? |
| Robby |
That was from a show in Detroit, I believe,
and he played on a couple of things. |
| Rainer |
Why wasn't there any live recording of the Doors
after Jim's death, of The Butts Band or something? |
| Robby |
Oh, you know, we did a live recording with the
Butts Band in Boston, but I don't know whatever happened with it. |
| Rainer |
Who's idea was the Butts Band? |
| Robby |
Well, you know, we were in England looking for
a singer for The Doors and John and I decided, well, what are we gonna do?
Let's just stay there and see what we can get going, so we got this group
together with Jess Roden, Phil Chen and Roy Davies and we called it The Butts
Band, it was Jess Roden's name for the group he had before, which was also
called the Butts Band, and we liked It. It was a good band. |
| Rainer |
Yeah, definitely. You also played with Blue
öyster Cult live.. |
| Robby |
"Roadhouse Blues", yeah. It was out there at
the Country Club in the valley. They called me up one day and said that they're
gonna be playing, if I could come down. I played on a lot on their stuff
and the producers sometimes used it, sometimes they didn't. Sometimes they
couldn't use it because of some legal thing or something, played some real
good stuff on their new album in fact, the album they just released but recorded
years ago. Yeah, I did a lot of guitar, and people thought it must have been
a real öyster guy who plays the guitar. |
| Rainer |
I always wondered why there's this nice little
song "Treetrunk" not on the "Full Circle" album. |
| Robby |
Well, I think it sounded too commercial for
the album. Somebody else should sing it, you know, but that's funny that
you remember that one! |
| Rainer |
John is thinking about The Doors doing the
soundtrack for the Morrison movie. . . |
| Robby |
Yeah, we'll probably do that. I mean, who else
could do that? |
| Rainer |
But you are not gonna act in the movie? |
| Robby |
Oh no, I don't think so. |
| Rainer |
Are there any unpublished Doors songs? |
| Robby |
Unpublished Doors songs? Not many good ones.
There's a version of "Whiskey, Mystics And Men" that is pretty good. They
swept the bottom of the files anything of use would be used. |
| Rainer |
Ray once talked about a song called "Happy For
A Night And A Day"... |
| Robby |
Did he? Well, I don't remember that. |
| Rainer |
Why didn't you take care of how they reproduced
the lyrics in all official songbooks? For example in "Unknown Soldier" the
songbooks say "... practice where the news is read ..." instead of the
correct "breakfast". |
| Robby |
I think we were just too lazy to read those
(laughs). It's funny: Practice! |
| Rainer |
Do you remember July 3, 1981 , when Père
Lachaise was packed with fans? |
| Robby |
Yeah, that was good, I thought, you know, amazing
how many people were there, but I thought it was bad painting all the other
monuments and stuff. We arranged the bust over there, well, but before that
bust was there we gave Pamela the duty of doing that, gave her a lot of money,
but she never did anything. Her parents were going to put her in the same
grave, I don't know if they actually did that. Her parents were really committed
to Jim, you know. Businesswise there's still contact. They're very unreasonable.
The poetry should be published, and they don't do it, and the movie, you
know, a sort of legal mess. Sue us, sue this, sue that. It's so stupid, you
know, because Jim would never have wanted his estate to go to those people. |
| Rainer |
I was always wondering what he would say it
he knew that some other people than Pamela have control over his poetry and
other stuff. Did you ever read Jim's unpublished poetry from his "127 Fascination
Box"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, some of it. It wasn't that good. You know
it was Jim's stuff that he didn't want to put out. Most of it was written
before he went to Paris. There is some stuff that he wrote there, and that's
pretty good. They should put that out. There is some more stuff that's pretty
good, but in Jim's mind he didn't think it was good enough to use. That's
why we never used it. So I don't think it'll be right to use it right now,
you know. Anyway, that's a big legal mess, too. The lawyers that have possession
of it think it's theirs, Corky thinks it's his, and blah, blah, blah! |
| Rainer |
Do you guys ever think about releasing "HWY"? |
| Robby |
Yeah, we'd like to. Well, it's not really a
movie, but much of shots, and it's unfinished, you know. The estate owns
it, and they haven't done anything with it. I wish they would do something
with it, cos it's interesting stuff. I wish they'd put it together with "Feast
Of Friends" maybe, and some other things. It would make a good video. |
| Rainer |
What are your plans for the future? |
| Robby |
Music, what else? |